Ch.44. The Human Boy of Punk City

After finishing dinner where synthetic meat was served again as a side dish, french fries came out as a late-night snack.

The children eagerly ate the fries, saying it had been a long time since they had a late-night snack.

“Heeng… I feel like I’m going to get fat.”

Sonia looked back and forth between the french fries and her belly fat with concern.

Her words sounded like adorable whining to Amon.

During the growth period, it’s fine to eat as much as you want.

That was Amon’s belief.

Besides, given Sonia’s constitution, she didn’t need to worry about obesity with this amount.

Her belly fat tended to gather a bit higher up…

‘That’s enough.’

Amon caught his wandering thoughts.

He placed some french fries on Sonia’s plate and grabbed a handful for himself.

The potatoes in the french fries were real potatoes.

There was some Gene Modification involved, but as far as Amon knew, there were no side effects.

That’s why french fries were one of the few foods in this world that he could eat with peace of mind.

“Munch munch.”

Sonia picked up one or two to eat, and soon set aside her worries about getting fat and started eating them deliciously.

Although he had to spend almost all the money he earned yesterday and today, Amon felt satisfied.

Seeing how much the children enjoyed it, he didn’t mind spending the money at all.

Amon dumped the last remaining crumbs into his mouth, making the most of the late-night snack.

*

Brush brush

After the late-night snack time ended, it was time to sleep.

Amon was brushing his teeth in front of the sink, reviewing today.

‘Shooting in the Howard Side area. That’s the seventh week in a row. Gangs are the same now as they were 50 years ago.’

Although he was currently living his daily life in an orphanage, he knew exactly where he had been reincarnated.

And he also knew why he had been reincarnated.

To see and enjoy many things in a wider world.

And if possible, to become a legend.

If we compare it to a game, would it make sense to say it’s about achieving his own true ending?

Though the goal seemed vague, the image was concrete.

He collected information every day without fail in preparation for when he would eventually plunge into the world.

What period this world was in, what the location was, and how the power dynamics worked.

And in the current situation, which area he should dive into, and so on.

Even when doing errands, he chose delivery jobs with mediocre pay not only for safety but also to gather information.

Summarizing the information he had gathered so far, first, he had been reincarnated in America.

The time period was 50 years after the Punk City 3 ending.

Since Punk City is numbered by time period, strictly speaking, Amon was experiencing Punk City 4 in real-time.

This world, 50 years after 3, had changed more than expected.

First, the neon signs that made people dizzy remained the same.

To be precise, as times improved, they weren’t neon signs but budget LED element screens, but they were essentially the same, so moving on.

The gloomy city, money prioritized over human rights, and the paper tiger-like public authority remained the same.

However, the sky had become a bit clearer.

Not because corporations suddenly awakened their conscience and started using eco-friendly fuels and materials, but because they discovered more efficient and less polluting energy.

The name of this renewable energy was Entity.

Urban legends, supernatural phenomena, ghosts, cryptids, creatures—the expressions referring to these beings varied, but the standard term was Entity.

Amon felt goosebumps all over his body when he learned this fact.

‘So the bastards finally did it…’

This crazy world had finally started to view even supernatural phenomena as money.

For example, if you secured the red shoes that walk endlessly and the infinite staircase that goes down forever, and combined them to run a generator?

Wow! Perpetual motion!

This era, where ideas that even Satan would be impressed by were implemented as if they were natural, was the era Amon was born into.

‘The genre is cyberpunk… no, since there’s magic and genetic engineering too, is it fusion punk?’

Amon thought it might be eco-punk since they used renewable energy, but he quickly denied it.

After all, exploiting anomalies and urban legends to run generators and calling it eco-friendly was a bit…

It made him feel somewhat ambivalent.

Therefore, his conclusion was that it was an ambiguous fusion punk.

Taking cyberpunk as the base, add a spoonful of magic, a spoonful of genetic engineering, and finally a pinch of urban.

That was this world.

The location of his orphanage was also completely different from the setting of 3.

This was within his expectations.

After all, the locations changed in 1, 2, and 3 as well.

Even though the locations changed, news of the previous protagonists was still heard.

The true endings of each series were so massive that they often overturned world history, so it was natural.

In this world, the true ending of 3 had become official history.

However, not only the true ending but other endings were also sporadically visible.

‘Maybe they’re somewhat mixed as long as they don’t contradict the true ending.’

As an example, there was an ending that completely changed the direction of gangs.

– The Executioner’s Gun… really exists!!!

That was what a legendary gang shouted during a live broadcast as they were executed by a corporation in California 50 years ago.

After that execution, gangs that had stayed in the area hoping to find that treasure began to travel all over America.

They had spread so widely that <Children of the Snake>, which Jimmy had recently joined, crossed two states to reach the city where Amon was.

The ending that opened the era of mega-gangs was titled <The One Treasure>.

Surprisingly, this wasn’t the true ending but a normal ending.

Other normal or bad endings were also occasionally heard.

In other words, this world was a combination of various endings.

‘Perhaps each ending of 3 was the life of different people.’

So Amon searched through newspapers and history books whenever he could, looking for endings.

Which ending was official history and which was unofficial.

That was the information Amon collected.

This part was almost completely organized thanks to ten years of information gathering.

“RRRRRRRR~ Too!”

Having finished defining the world view and organizing history, Amon spat out his mouthwash and thought about the weapons he had.

First, he didn’t have knowledge of the future.

The era he was living in now hadn’t been released as a game yet.

But he had richer knowledge of the past than anyone else.

While people can only live in one timeline at a time, Amon’s mind contained information from numerous parallel worlds after going through countless playthroughs.

Not only that, but he also knew forgotten knowledge of the past, and even secrets of the world that hadn’t surfaced, in the form of settings.

He firmly believed this was his weapon.

However, there were also regrettable points.

‘Well, for skill proficiency, it’s not a game, so it can’t be helped…’

Just in case, he tried various methods to see if he could gain proficiency like in a game.

He tried spinning in place to increase his stamina stat, and hitting a dummy with an iron pipe to increase his sword proficiency.

And his conclusion:

This is reality.

Not a simulation or a game, but real reality.

Proficiency boosting is impossible.

Status opening is impossible.

However, there was a harvest in the process of confirming this.

‘The talent system definitely exists.’

He couldn’t check it on a screen like in a game, and he couldn’t distribute stats directly at birth, but he could clearly tell.

The talent system exists in a way similar to games.

Amon left the washroom and headed to his bedroom, recalling the settings of the talent stats.

By tradition in Punk City, you could distribute talent stats when creating a character.

Talent was an important value that not only received proficiency bonuses in specific routes or skill trees but also affected the maximum potential.

Of course, even with talent, the initial talent didn’t dictate the entire game.

If you invested a lot of time in the middle, or twisted your whole body to find opportunities, you could break through the maximum potential beyond talent.

But Amon didn’t have a hobby of taking detours when there was an easy path.

He preferred the efficient way.

Because of this, he had been trying to find his talent for the past ten years.

He created a list of all talents that appeared from 1 to 3 as candidates and crossed them out one by one as he checked.

First, it was certain that he had high charm.

At least 40% of people he met for the first time were kind to him.

‘Just this makes life so much easier.’

You might think what’s the use of high charm, but surprisingly, even in games, charm was a stat that needed to meet at least the minimum requirement, if not the maximum.

If your charm stat was low, all kinds of unfair treatment would come your way even if you hadn’t done anything wrong.

– You seem suspicious. I’m going to forget about our agreement to cooperate.

NPCs who should cooperate would suddenly get cranky,

– This is the regular price. Go to another store. See how much they’ll give you. *Spits*

Merchants would try to rip you off at every opportunity,

– Wait. Don’t come closer. Stop there and don’t follow me.

If your charm stat was 0, only 10% would be polite at first meeting, and 90% would draw weapons and be on guard just by making eye contact.

If it went into the negative, there were even events where you’d be dragged to the police station while doing nothing. (Regardless of skin color.)

Especially if you were dragged to the police station during a time-out quest, you could fail the quest and go straight to a bad ending, so charm had to be at least at the minimum.

However, if you didn’t care about the story and just wanted to cause trouble, you could intentionally set your charm stat low.

Or conversely, you could set your appearance like a monstrous creature but set your charm stat high to turn the genre into comedy.

‘Ah… I don’t miss you, X-ray developer.’

If you maxed out the charm of a bizarre purple monster, people would fall in love with that purple monster one after another.

Watching that on screen was hilariously funny, so Amon always allocated maximum charm when creating bizarre characters.

Of course, in reality, charm wouldn’t apply like in a game, and even if it did, he didn’t want to be born as a purple monster.

Anyway, after checking the charm box,

After that, no more check marks were added to Amon’s talent list.

Not much talent in the magic category.

Not much in eloquence or agitation either, and not much talent in crafting.

By process of elimination, these areas got crossed out.

Hacking was still on hold as he couldn’t test it yet.

What remained were weapons and firearms.

And the day to confirm these was not far off.

Tomorrow.

He planned to check his talent.

‘I should sleep early today.’

He stopped thinking and pulled up the blanket.

It would be a big problem if he dozed off while shooting.

***

A day passed, and finally, the day Amon had been waiting for arrived.

Thanksgiving.

America’s version of Chuseok.

A festival day filled with delicious food and fun games in the streets!

… There was nothing like that.

In a world where everyone’s looking out for themselves, how could there be overflowing goodwill in the streets for a festival in a punk genre?

In cyberpunk, Thanksgiving was a day when citizens opened their wallets a bit more happily, and corporations could exploit people while wearing a slightly more benevolent mask.

But it wasn’t just a hollow day.

On Thanksgiving, there were Black Friday sales and special events.

Amon was aiming for this.

What money would an orphanage have to buy guns or knives for orphans?

Because of this, Amon hadn’t been able to check if he had talent with guns or knives until now.

But Thanksgiving was different.

On this day, you could experience guns or swords that you normally couldn’t even touch without money.

Shooting ranges or dojos would hold competitions with prizes on this occasion.

Even if not for competitions, people tended to loosen their wallets during this period, so they would offer free trials.

Coincidentally, this year Amon was 15, and with the orphanage director’s permission to handle guns, he finally had the opportunity to pull a trigger.

“Top marksman Amon, deploying~”

Amon muttered to himself as he happily left the orphanage.

“Hehe.”

Sonia followed behind Amon.

Amon had told her there was no need to come along, but she said she wanted to try it at least once and followed him.

The two passed through the bustling streets on the holiday and headed to the shooting range.

Bang bang!

Deafening gunshots echoed from <The Constitution of America> shooting range.

“I’m here to participate in the competition!!”

Amon shouted towards the gun shop owner amidst the noise.

The owner gestured from behind the bulletproof glass counter that he couldn’t hear.

Amon moved closer to the glass and shouted.

“Competition!! Participate!!!!”

The gun shop owner nodded.

He handed Amon a paper with the rules.

Amon had already familiarized himself with the competition rules, so he skimmed through it and stuffed it in his pocket.

The rules were simple.

Score as many points as possible within the time limit.

The targets generally move, and the scoring method differs for each firearm.

Amon borrowed an old pistol and rifle and stood at the shooting range.

An announcement came through the speaker in his booth.

[Get ready. 3, 2, 1. Start!]

Bang!

He pulled the pistol’s trigger.

With a heavy recoil, his shoulder jerked and his wrist ached.

‘Ow. That hurts more than I thought.’

Thinking about it, it made sense.

In this world, the targets that needed to be shot were non-humans with skin thicker than wild boar hide, or cyborgs with steel-replaced skin, and so on.

The average caliber and charge had to be on a completely different level from his previous life.

Even Amon, who prided himself on being physically strong among his peers regardless of species, found it difficult to fully control the recoil.

His hand was tingling, but he continued to pull the trigger.

After finishing with the pistol, he switched to the rifle and started shooting.

Since rapid fire was prohibited, he calmly pulled the trigger in single shots: tung tung tung.

Perhaps due to the recoil, the bullets kept slightly deviating from the target point.

The final result was 1100 points.

Most of the bullets were in the 10-point zone, some in the 9-point zone, and the one that deviated the furthest was in the 7-point zone.

The shooting range manager applauded and congratulated Amon.

“You won’t starve to death wherever you go.”

Amon agreed.

With this level of talent, he could at least make a living as a mercenary.

As he returned the gun, Amon inwardly evaluated his firearm talent rating.

‘Guns are not it.’

It wasn’t bad.

But with this, he couldn’t see the highest potential.

Amon’s goal was to see the true ending.

The humans he would meet would have neural accelerators as a basic setup and could fire technomagic beams that could penetrate tanks.

To face such people, he would need to hit 10 points consistently even with rapid fire while holding rifles on both sides.

Because of this, Amon’s assessment of his gun talent was ‘mediocre.’

‘Guns are on hold for now.’

He left a triangle mark on his talent candidate list.

After concluding about guns, Amon waited for Sonia before heading to the next location.

Eventually, it was Sonia’s turn.

She shouldered the rifle with a serious expression and pulled the trigger.

Tadadadadang!

“???”

An unusual rapid-fire sound echoed.

The judge was about to disqualify Sonia for using rapid-fire mode in a competition where only single shots were allowed.

But-

“This is single shot, though?”

As if to prove her innocence, she demonstrated single-shot mode rapid fire again.

Her fingers moved so fast they left afterimages.

Dudududududu!

“Huh? Uhh…?”

The judge was also confused and asked her.

“Do you have implants in your fingers?”

“No? I haven’t had any procedures done.”

The judge was once again surprised by the fact that she was a pure human.

After careful consideration, he acknowledged her innocence.

And so her shooting show resumed.

Sonia shot at targets with single shots that seemed like rapid fire.

The end of her gun was incredibly stable.

So stable that you could place a cup of water on the muzzle.

As if the recoil wasn’t implemented in a budget gun game, there was no recoil at all.

‘What’s going on? Are there four cushions absorbing the recoil?’

All her bullets were embedded right in the center of the target.

At some point, everyone at the shooting range was watching her in a daze.

After her shooting ended, the score was revealed.

3500 points.

Amon patted Sonia’s shoulder and said.

“Looks like your career path is pretty clear.”